CHICAGO, (EWA) – The
European Union (EU) and Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) have announced
that the rules on slaughtering horses for human consumption are about to change
radically due to concerns regarding contaminated horse meat.

The new EU rules will become effective in April 2010,
requiring that either slaughtered animals have complete health records showing
they have not received banned substances or a 180 day quarantine for the
horses. Claude Boissonnealut, head of the CFIAs red meat programs, has
indicated that Canada
will likely abide by the 180 day quarantine, as mandated by the EU.

Equine welfare advocates have warned of the contamination
of American horse meat for years. Substances banned from food animals range
from toxic wormers to phenylbutazone (PBZ), the “aspirin” of the horse world,
and even include fertility drugs that can cause miscarriages in women. “PBZ is
a known carcinogen and can cause aplastic anemia (bone marrow suppression) in
humans”, says Equine Welfare Alliance (EWA) member Dr. Ann Marini, MD/Ph.D, Professor
of Neurology at UniformServicesUniversity
of the Health Sciences.

But the list of contaminants is not limited to
conventional drugs. “Some of the garbage ‘treatments’ that are given to
performance horses included iodine-peanut oil injections along the spine,
anabolic steroids, cocaine, amphetamines, opioids and even snake venom”,
explains Dr. Nicholas Dodman, DVM at Tufts University.

The new rules will mean that horses coming from auctions
and other sources in the US
will have to be kept drug free on a feedlot for half a year. Producers estimate
that feeding horses that long will more than double their cost, making them
less competitive with horses from other sources. And that is likely to be only
half their problem.

EWA member Christy Sheidy, of Another Chance 4 Horses,
routinely rescues slaughter bound horses from Pennsylvania’s New Holland auction. Sheidy warns,
“Outbreaks of diseases like strangles and shipping fever will be inevitable in
these quarantine feedlots. Left untreated, many horses may die before they can
be slaughtered.” Treating the horses would restart their quarantine time.

In recent years, European authorities have cracked down on
horse meat producers within the EU, requiring a “passport” system that
specifically documents whether a horse has received such substances. Owners
must state that their horses are intended for slaughter.

USDA statistics show that in 2008, the US exported
56,731 horses to Mexico
and 77,073 horses to Canada
for slaughter, resulting in the second highest slaughter total since 1995.
Diners abroad have no idea whatsoever what dangerous chemicals they are eating
in the American horsemeat that is shipped from plants across our borders.

In an interviewwith EWA, Henry Skjerven, a
former director of the Natural Valley Farms slaughter operation in Saskatchewan, Canada,
said:“Unfortunately, North
America, US and Canada,
were never geared for raising horses for food consumption. The system as it
stood when we were killing horses was in no way, shape or form, safe, in my
opinion.”

Skjerven went on to say, “We
did not know where those horses were coming from, what might be in them or what
they were treated with. I was always in fear - I think that it was very valid -
that we were going to send something across there [to the EU] and we were
simply going to get our doors locked after we had some kind of issue with the
product.”

Skjerven’s plant began killing
horses in September of 2007 for the Belgium’s Velda Group following the
closing of their Cavel slaughter plant in DeKalb,
Illinois. NaturalValley’s
horse slaughter plant was closed by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in
January of 2009, for health issues.

Unlike Canada, horses
going to Mexico
are killed in two types of slaughter plants. The three largest plants export
the meat to the EU and will fall under the same new rules. Mexican authorities
have yet to announce whether their smaller plants, that provide meat for
domestic consumption, will be required to follow the new rules.

“We don’t need to eat horses.
Horses are for riding, jumping and doing a whole lot of great things. They’re
not food”, concluded Skjerven.